


Caroling, caroling through the snow

by Sholio



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Babysitter Steve Harrington, Christmas, Christmas Caroling, Fluff, Gen, Holidays, Post-Season/Series 02, Snow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-23
Updated: 2017-12-23
Packaged: 2019-02-18 20:05:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13107579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sholio/pseuds/Sholio
Summary: The Hawkins Middle School AV club gets a holiday fundraising idea, and Steve is just along for the ride. (Literally.)





	Caroling, caroling through the snow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [laura47](https://archiveofourown.org/users/laura47/gifts).



"Caroling," Steve said. "You want to go caroling."

This seemed to be the cue for the whole nerd gang to start talking at once.

"It's for the AV club!"

"-- raising funds for --"

"Mr. Clarke suggested --"

"Whoa, hey, stop." Steve stepped inside the Wheelers' front door so he could close it and get warm. He'd just showed up to give Dustin and Lucas a lift home; the snow was coming down pretty heavy outside, too much for biking according to official parental decree, settling on Steve's uncovered hair and the shoulders of his jacket just in the short walk from the car. "One at a time. Fundraiser, huh?"

"For the AV club," Dustin said, nodding.

"So are you making them pay you to _stop_ singing, or ..."

This got him four identical glares of just-turned-teenage offended dignity, and Mike muttered to the others, "Told you he wouldn't do it."

"I never said I wouldn't do it, I just want to know why I'm suddenly involved in this."

"Because we can't do it without a grownup," Will said.

"Jonathan's working and Nancy's busy and doesn't have a car anyway, and Mom can't do it because of Holly --"

"And Mr. Clarke was supposed to take us, he's the one we've been practicing with, but he has the flu."

Lucky Mr. Clarke, Steve thought. But he couldn't help feeling a little warm lift in his chest that they'd thought of him, even though it was probably only because all other options had been ruled out. "When?" he asked.

"Friday afternoon after school lets out early for the holiday," Mike said.

"It'll be us and Max," Lucas put in.

"We're going to hit all the businesses downtown."

Now they all looked hopeful. Will, especially, had that puppy-dog-eye thing down. 

"Okay, fine," Steve said quickly, "but only if you two -- yes, the ones right there -- get into the car right now, because you all do realize I've got better things to do than run you around town, right?"

Will and Mike high-fived, and Lucas and Dustin grabbed their backpacks and scampered out to the car through the falling snow. Steve turned to follow, but hesitated: it would probably be a good idea to talk to one of their actual, legal guardians about this. "Where's your --" he started to ask Mike, but the question was answered when Mrs. Wheeler appeared in the hallway.

"Oh, don't leave yet, here," she said, pressing a plastic-wrapped plate of cookies into his hands. "Fresh gingerbread cookies."

"Steve's taking us caroling, Mrs. Wheeler!" Will chirped.

"Really? I hope you all asked politely and I hope you made it very clear" -- this with a look at Steve -- "that he doesn't _have_ to."

"I don't mind," Steve said, half-truthfully. The plate of cookies was warm in his hands. Being around Mrs. Wheeler without Nancy hadn't stopped being weird yet. She was still friendly, but there was also a sense of distance, a certain mutual awkwardness; it was a little bit disconcerting to recognize his own mixed emotions in someone who he had, until recently, classified as one of the alien "parent" species.

"Well, in that case, you've definitely made their Christmas. Thank you. Oh --" She spun around. "Holly, no, leave that alone, sweetheart, it's for the tree --"

Steve made a quick getaway, slipping and sliding on the Wheelers' as-yet-unshoveled front walk. As soon as he opened the car door, he was greeted with vexed voices.

"What did you do, take a nap?"

"Yeah, we're freezing out here."

Steve shoved the plate of cookies into Dustin's hands. "Present from Mrs. Wheeler," he said as he started the car and cranked up the heat. 

There was some industrious rustling from the passenger seat as the plastic was removed and the ribbon stripped off for easy cookie access. Lucas dangled over the back of the seat to grab one.

"So," Steve said, leaning past Lucas to rummage for the brush to sweep off the car, "just out of curiosity, _can_ any of you sing?"

"Details," Dustin said through a mouthful of gingerbread cookie.

Friday, Steve thought, sweeping snow off the car with his freezing hands pulled into his coat, gripping the snow brush through the sleeves. Last day of classes before the holiday. Usually he'd come up with some excuse for his folks to explain being out late, and then see who among his classmates was throwing a party. Last year he'd hung out with Nancy. This year ... it looked like he got to herd around a bunch of middle schoolers. In the snow.

So this was his life now.

 

*

 

Since Friday was a half day, Steve skipped entirely (it wasn't like anything interesting was going to happen, and Jason on the basketball team could let him know if Mrs. Ivers had assigned work for the break because it'd be just like the old bat). Still, he was there at the middle school to pick up the brats, as promised.

The snow from earlier in the week had mostly melted off, clinging in slushy piles along gutters and building edges, but a new storm front was rolling in, and a white blanket settled over the middle school's scraggly lawn, the buses, and the waiting parents' cars while Steve leaned on his car and waited, collar turned up, for the little jerks to bother coming out. He was starting to (irritatedly) wonder if they'd actually gotten a ride with Jonathan or somebody, when they _finally_ all piled out of the door.

As soon as they got close enough that Steve could see what they were wearing, he said, "No."

"No what?" Mike asked, pausing in the act of opening the back door of Steve's BMW.

"No, I'm not going out in public with you dressed like that."

They were all wearing matching felt reindeer antlers. Steve couldn't tell what sort of fashion sins their coats were hiding, but he had a bad feeling about it.

"Don't worry," Dustin said, rummaging under his coat before holding something out. "We brought you a pair."

"I'm sorry, did I say no? I meant oh _hell_ no."

Ten minutes later, he was somehow wearing the stupid reindeer antlers and hoping he didn't run into anybody he knew, while the kids had a whispered huddle outside Roy's Bait & Tackle, on the extreme end of what passed for Hawkins' downtown drag, and therefore their starting point. Steve hung back with his hands in the pockets of his jacket and looked up the street.

Early as it still was, the increasingly heavy snow dimmed the light to the quality of early dusk. Downtown was, as always, at least moderately festive, the street lights decked with wreaths and the businesses displaying dangling lights. The wink of the lights (some colorful, others gold and silver) gave Steve a disturbing mix of feelings, nostalgia for childhood Christmases blended with residual terror from last year's Christmas lights at the Byers house. 

Growing up had its compensations, but he was starting to think that being an adult, even if just a sort of a rookie one, really sucked around Christmastime. He remembered when downtown Hawkins, with the wreaths and the lights, used to seem magical. Now it just looked tawdry and small, even in the falling snow. You lost Santa and the magic and the big pile of presents under the tree in exchange for ... well, being stupidly responsible and giving up your Fridays to wait around in the snow for the kids you were babysitting ...

"Hey!" Dustin tumbled out the door of the bait & tackle shop and shoved something into Steve's hands. It was a coffee can, festively decorated with red-and-green glitter and paint; a colorful sign reading HAWKINS MIDDLE SCHOOL AV CLUB EQUIPMENT FUND -- the letters getting smaller and smaller as they ran out of room toward the bottom -- was glued to the front. 

"C'mon, c'mon." Dustin tugged at Steve's jacket. "Everybody else is inside."

"What am I supposed to do, shake this and look hopeful?" Steve asked, letting himself be dragged into the cramped interior of the shop, already filled with damp kids.

"Sure, unless you want to sing --"

"No singing," Steve said quickly. He wedged himself into a corner and watched the kids attempting to form up into a line, with a lot of shoving and rustling of their hand-printed lyric sheets. After another whispered consultation, they launched into the first verse of "Jingle Bells."

They were actually, surprisingly ... not terrible. It was obvious they'd been practicing. At least some of them could hit the notes (Will in particular had a beautiful, clear voice) and those who couldn't (Dustin and Max in particular) made up in volume what they lacked in skill. They all started out red-faced and obviously embarrassed, but by the end they were clearly having fun, and Steve left with a few bucks stuffed through the slot in the plastic coffee can lid.

"How much do we have in there? How much?" Dustin attempted to grab it away from him, but Steve clung to it and tucked it under his coat. "Hey, I'm the club treasurer. I _have_ to know; it's my job!"

"Count your money at the end, man. C'mon." Steve nudged open the door to Lily's Antiques with his elbow. "You've got a lot of Hawkins to get through and we're losing daylight, not to mention it's cold as balls out here. Let's roll."

 

*

 

They did the entire street, staying extra long in Melvald's, where Joyce clapped and Will squirmed and various customers stuffed dollars into their can. At the end of their second encore, after shoving a handful of crumpled bills through the lid of the can, Joyce took Steve aside and stuffed a twenty -- that he suspected she couldn't afford -- into his hand. "Take them down to the Burger King in Allensville," she murmured, and when he nodded, she reached up to pat him absently on the antlers like he was one of her actual kids.

So, when it got dark and the businesses started closing, Steve did that, navigating the icy, unplowed streets to the slightly bigger town down the highway, where the chain restaurants were. They ended up all stuffed into a booth, three kids on one side and two kids plus Steve on the other, a mess of clammy wet coats and elbows jammed into each other's ribs. The haul from the can was spread out on the table, lots of crumpled dollars, lots of change, a few fives and tens. There was pushing and shoving and kids leaning across the table to yell at each other, getting their sleeves in ketchup, Dustin cursing at them because they kept making him lose count.

Steve was wedged against the wall, barely able to move, with Will tucked up against his side and Max across from him. He could hardly hear himself think with all the yelling, but in this terrible weather they were the only people in the place, and the bored-looking teenager at the counter didn't look like she planned to throw them out.

And to think he could've been spending his last Friday before break trying to find a party or seeing if he could hook up with one of his old girlfriends. That sounded ...

Boring. Empty. Small. Tawdry as Hawkins' cheaply decorated little downtown, which hadn't actually been that bad after all.

Even if he still couldn't feel his toes in his wet shoes. The first thing he was going to do when he got home was take a long, very hot shower.

Still, it hadn't been a bad afternoon, surprisingly. He really did enjoy spending time with these little assholes. Dammit.

"Hey Steve," Will said, and Steve was jolted out of his thoughts by a small hand reaching up to poke his antlers. Steve reached up; he'd forgotten he was still wearing them.

"Yeah, what?"

"Thanks," Will said with a shy grin.

"Oh, hey." Dustin moved his tray out of the way, scraped up the money, and started separating out some of the bills, muttering under his breath; then he pushed a pile of dollars and change toward Steve. "There you go."

"There I go, what?"

"There's your share," Lucas said.

Max nodded. "One sixth."

Steve stared at the paltry little pile of money. It was next to nothing for him; hell, he probably spent almost that much on gas for the BMW every week. But it was a lot for the kids. "Why are you giving me this?"

"Because you didn't have to drive us around and be a good sport about it," Dustin said, giving him a level look. "We know you didn't want to. And you're not even in the AV club, so it's only fair."

"Every member of the party gets their share," Will said, nodding.

Goddammit. That _wasn't_ a prickling at the back of his eyes. "So, what I'm going to do is contribute my share to the Hawkins Middle School AV club," Steve said, shoving it back in Dustin's direction. "Have fun with your radio equipment, nerds."

He tried to ignore the way Dustin's eyes were shining at him, but it was downright impossible to ignore Will's small arm sneaking around him and giving him a shy hug. Well, it wasn't like he had any cool left to speak of. Steve got his arm around Will and hugged him back.

And this seemed to be a signal for everyone to pile together in a kind of mass hug, with hands stretching across the table to grab at each other. Steve got Max in something that was more like a headlock than a hug (and her sweater was getting in her ketchup again, _dammit_ ), and Mike was half on top of Lucas, and Steve had his hand tangled up in Dustin's, and they were all just kind of a big pile of kids and one slightly bemused sort-of-adult.

Okay, so maybe growing up didn't just mean losing the magic of childhood. Maybe adulthood at Christmas was actually kind of fun on its own.


End file.
